Twilight Of The Turtle

Mitch McConnell has a number of problems. The first is that he's, well, Mitch McConnell. The second is that, as Mitch McConnell, he is the leader of the Republican caucus of the United States Senate. The third is that, as Mitch McConnell, the leader of the Republican caucus of the United States Senate, he presides over a group of men representing a party that has gone utterly insane at almost every level on which it exists. Taken together, these three problems have combined to help Mitch McConnell look very foolish, a process that the Lexington Herald-Leader is more than happy to explain to people who may have joined us late.

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What in the world did he mean last week when he told reporters that repeal of the Affordable Care Act - "root and branch," as he has demanded many times - is "unconnected" to the future of Kynect, Kentucky's health insurance exchange? Asked specifically if Kynect should be dismantled, McConnell said: "I think that's unconnected to my comments about the overall question." Huh? Nothing could be more connected - or should be more important to Kentucky's senior senator - than the fates of the more than 400,000 Kentuckians who are getting health insurance, many for the first time, and the federal Affordable Care Act, which is making that possible. Repeal the federal law, which McConnell calls "Obamacare," and the state exchange would collapse.

He means, clearly, that he's Mitch McConnell, and that his job is wrangling the higher functioning crazoids in his party, and what do you want from the guy, so shut up, already.

We asked the McConnell campaign for a clarification and were sent the usual talking points and a statement saying, "If Obamacare is repealed, Kentucky should decide for itself whether to keep Kynect or set up a different marketplace," a suggestion that is unconnected to reality.

A mark, that will surely leave.

If this hopeless position is why McConnell's career goes under at the polls this November, and if we have the happier outcome of a Senator Alison Lundergan Grimes, a big assist has to go to Kentucky governor Steve Beshear, who set out to make the Affordable Care Act work for as many citizens as he could, and who has become extremely popular as a result, and who, as a lovely byproduct, has middled Mitch McConnell into incoherence. He is one of the few politicians in America who's managed to succeed in defeating the curious dynamic by which voters say they hate "Obamacare," but love all of its component parts. In fact, even given his age, why Beshear isn't mentioned more frequently by the anybody-but-Hillary faction within the Democratic party is puzzling, although there has been some talk about his taking the second spot on the ticket. If he helps rid the Senate of Mitch McConnell while doing right by the citizens of his state, though, I'd say his work is pretty much done.